Use of Product Images

[cassie]

Hello,

With respect to a review page of 3 - 5 products, are you allowed to use just the image of a product if you are not affiliated with that company, or do you need to be affiliated with that company before doing so?

If you are affiliated with that company, are you allowed to rank the product #2, #3 etc ...., or do they not want you promoting the product if you are not ranking it #1 ?

Thank you.

[jmpruitt]

i personally wouldnt do a number rating. a 5 star rating system is gets better conversions, and then I would rate them 4-5 stars, I dont promote it if i dont think it deserves a 4 star. for example, set them up in a review table like this one:
http://www.websitesplash.net/best-affil ... -products/
I always include a statement that i only include the best products to help them with the problems that I am targeting.

if you are not an affiliate why are you doing a review? if it is a bad product and you are doing a negative review, be careful. they usually dont convert even when recommending another product in its place.

I am not sure on using a product image in that case, they may not want you using it if you are not promoting them. that is up to the merchant. technically they hold copyright on their images. you use them as an affiliate with their permission.

[cassie]

Thank you for your reply.

If I give my top product 5 stars, product two 4 1/2 stars, and product three 4 stars, do I need to be an affiliate for ALL of the products? Will the merchants for products two and three allow you to promote something that you are not giving top recommendation ?

Thank you.

[jmpruitt]

yes. they really dont have any say about what you do on your site. The reason for having them on your site is to promote them. I often get more sales of my 4 star products than I do of the 5 star ones.

[cassie]

thank you for the clarification

[gradyp]

Another tack you can take, cassie is a "best of the best" approach. Here, you might have one "overall" product that you recommend that covers everything, but then you might have 4 or 5 other "Best this" and "Best that" products. For example, if you were doing, say learn guitar, you might have one that did everything, such as Jamorama, but then have a "Best Scales", a "Best Lead" or even one that might be tangentially related, but of interest to someone in guitars, such as a "Best Ear Training" or "Best Music Production".

This way, even if you are giving them all high marks, it's because they're "the best"! ;)

Grady

[cassie]

thank you for your reply